Descent Into Darkness With One Act of Revenge
by PrincessMaryJaneKOA
Summary: A one-shot look into Neville Longbottom's mind about his parents, his desire for revenge and his eventual descent into darkness 19 years after the final battle. Neville/Hannah Abbot and slight Ginny/Harry


It certainly wasn't the first time Neville Long bottom had thought about murder.

It wouldn't be the last either.

Other the years he had lain awake many nights, far too many to count. Trying to erase his memories. He remembered all those times he had gone to see his parents in St Mungo's

_His feet dragged across the floor as they often did, Neville hated himself for thinking it, but he really didn't want to see his parents. His grandmother had brought him here every holiday since he was old enough to comprehend what had happened to them._

_Neville's heart filled with a combination of extreme anger and extreme sadness at the sight of his parents. Their eyes were vacant, empty of all recognition, of him the son they never had a chance to know. They didn't talk much, just muttered nonsensical ramblings to themselves._

_Neville was at least grateful that his grandmother never made him stay too long. She too knew what it was like to watch them so close to him and yet always so far away. Like a light at the end of the tunnel that he could never reach._

_He didn't tell anyone at school what had happened, it was too painful and the last he wanted was for people to look at him the way they looked at Harry, a mixture of pity and as though he was a freak. Neville was a freak, but not for those reasons._

_Neville was probably the worst student at Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry. He was pretty much useless at everything except Herbology and even then, despite Professor Sprout's praise, Neville thought he was only average._

His Parents were reduced to living half a life because of a group of Death Eaters.

Bellatrix Lestrange, Barty Crouch Jr and Rodolphus and Rebastian Lestrange.

Those names would haunt Neville for the rest of his life. Sometimes when he least expected it he would think about killing them. It happened much more frequently when Neville discovered that they had all escaped Askaban prison.

Neville badly wanted to run away after that, to look for the Death Eaters and to kill them like they had almost killed his parents. Neville often had to pinch himself to remind him that he didn't have the skill to take on one Death Eater, let alone four or more at once. He reminded himself what it would do to his grandmother if he ran away, her only grandson, run away from school to go on a killing spree. But most importantly of all Neville reminded himself that he had to stay in school, no matter how tedious it was at times, because his parents had sacrificed their livelihood so that he could grow up and have a future. Neville couldn't just throw that all away.

He had to admit though, it was tempting.

Neville could have kicked himself; he had had his chance and lost it! Bellatrix Lestrange was in the Department of Mysteries, he had had the perfect chance to kill her and he had failed. He could hardly bear to remember it.

_They were running, they were outnumbered and surrounded by Death Eaters. When suddenly a dark haired woman appeared. Neville would know her face anywhere, it was Bellatrix Lestrange._

_Neville ran through a million ways of somehow killing her in his mind, when she spotted him. _

"_Neville Longbottom isn't it?" she had cried with a malicious smile._

"_How's mum and dad?" she laughed cruelly._

_Neville clenched his fists before gripping his wand tightly, getting ready for the moment when he would attack._

"_Better, now they're about to be avenged!" he had cried before pointing his wand at her, just as Bellatrix now pointed hers at him._

_But before Neville could even attempt to strike. Lucius Malfoy told Bellatrix to put away her wand. _

_The next few minutes seemed to pass in a blur one minute Lucius was holding his hand out for the prophecy and the next they were running from Death Eaters as thousands upon thousands of prophecies smashed and fell to the ground. Neville was blasting Death Eaters left and right but he never came across Bellatrix. But at that moment he was more interested in staying alive rather than exacting revenge._

_They ran through a door and the next thing Neville knew, he was separated from the others and had a wand being pointed at his throat by none other than Bellatrix Lestrange. Neville knew that to try and attack her now would be both stupid and useless. There were too many Death Eaters and besides, she had her wand pointed at his throat._

_Even Neville wasn't that stupid._

_Or so he hoped._

_All the same he couldn't stop himself when Lucius tried to coerce Harry into giving him the prophecy._

"_Don't give it to him Harry!"_

_Neville winced as Bellatrix jabbed her wand into him sharply._

_They had escaped that time. But only just._

Now 19 years after the final battle, Neville still thought about revenge. Bellatrix was dead of course, killed by Molly Weasley. He was relived and disappointed all at the same time. Grateful to Molly for killing her, but at the same time angry that he didn't kill her himself. Same with Barty Crouch jr whose soul had been sucked out by the Dementor's kiss. There were only two possible people left alive, Rodolphus and his brother Rabastan Lestrange. Neville didn't know what had happened to them since the final battle. But ever since his parent's deaths a few years ago, Neville had been determined to find them.

But things had changed, he was the Herbology teacher at Hogwarts now, he and his wife Hannah Abbot lived above the Leaky Cauldron. He couldn't just abandon his job and his wife to go off searching for two people who were probably dead by now or at the very least in Askaban, and what if he did find them? Was he really capable of murder? Was it worth it? The answers to those questions Neville already knew. So he told his wife that he had to go away for a while on official Hogwarts business, it was better she didn't know what was going on.

Harry Potter meanwhile, who had been living in relative obscurity since the final battle, got out of bed and waited for The Daily Prophet as he did each and every morning. As soon as the Owl set the newspaper down upon the table Harry thanked him, paid him and unrolled the newspaper to see the headline.

"FORMER DEATHEATER BROTHERS, RABASTAN AND RODOLPHUS LESTRANGE MURDRED IN COLD BLOOD!"

Harry was shocked at the news, after all he thought that they were either dead or locked up in Askaban. He wasn't upset by their death's on the contrary he was quite pleased, but what disturbed him the most was the vicious and somewhat random nature of the killings. It looked as though one fellow Death Eater had done this to them. Harry frowned; he really hoped that this wasn't the beginning of another battle.

His wife Ginny just sighed as she read the newspaper headline of Harry's shoulder, she knew that look. It was the look he got when he was considering some knew conspiracy theory or when he thought that Voldemort had risen from the dead.

"_If he doesn't stop thinking up all these conspiracy theories I'm going to go mad! Who's he going to accuse of being a Death Eater next? Neville?" _

Ginny laughed and as Harry turned around to stare at her quizzically she just shook her head, still smiling.

"_Neville! Yeah right" _she thought to herself, "_ As if!"_

And so began Neville Longbottom's descent into darkness.

AN: Just a random idea I had, I like the idea of a dark Neville and I wanted to explore how he might have felt about his parent's and his life in general other than what J.K Rowling has put in the books.


End file.
